A Strange Exchange

(For some brief explanation, Robless and I decided that Aya probably would have wandered in to get a look at Robless at some point, since she'd heard of him from Tam, and that we wanted to play that out. This is set sometime during Verax's isolation.)


Aya remembered hearing about Robless. Tam had spoken of him a few times, not as much as she'd talked about Verax, but enough to make an impression on young Aya. Each time her mother had mentioned him, or when Aya asked about him, Tam's eyes would cloud over and different emotions--sadness, pain, and something darker, something more like hate--would cross her face. It was enough to stir her curiosity. She had never seen Tam express anything like hate at any other time, and though Aya later found out that it was likely due to his massacre of her people, she still wanted to know more about why thinking of Robless affected Tam in such a way.

These things brought her to where she was now, along with a somewhat insatiable pull towards the room which she could not explain. She was actually wracked by anxiety standing there in front of the door to Robless' cell. It was partially being nervous about learning about the things that had led to her birth, but it was also partially because she found herself with a great amount of respect for Robless. Aya had studied much of the destruction Robless had caused during her research, and the things he was capable of astounded her.

Nonetheless, she fought through her apprehension, and slowly pushed open the door to the cell. The guards eyed her severely, but they were already familiar with her and how she could do almost anything that she wanted with Verax's permission, so they did not question her as she moved across the platform towards the cell, and slowly slid open the door.

Robless could sense Aya before the door even opened. The gnawing presence of darkness, the hunger for war and destruction, pervaded the room, yet it caused him no fear. It was almost comforting, and disturbingly familiar.

"Hello, Aya."

The room shifted when Aya walked in. The two of them found themselves in a perfectly white room, the same dimensions as the cell. What furniture remained dissolved into the white background, leaving Robless and Aya alone with two shadows in an empty room.

"I have wanted to meet you for some time, now, though I think we already know each other quite well. You have a shadow too, I see. I know that shadow as if it was my own. You'll notice we have a lot in common, then. We're of the same kind, beings of darkness."

He paused, then continued pacing.

"Do you know who I am? What I've done? How many lives I've ruined? If you're here for my story, hear me out. My past is a dark path. It is not a path for everyone to walk. I have the blood of an entire universe on my hands. Few have chosen to walk through that path with me, but nevertheless, it is still your choice."

Deep inside, in some part of herself that Aya did not dare to breach, she did know. She knew Robless personally. Knew his deepest, darkest secrets and his most disturbing fears. Some part of Aya--and she was deluding herself if she pretended she didn't know what part--knew exactly how to twist Robless' mind against him, to use him, to manipulate him, and to break him.

It was hard to want to fight the dam of knowledge that threatened to crash into her mind, but she held back the flood of darkness because it wasn't what she needed right now. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, only slightly thrown off by the change in her surroundings but knowing what had happened.

When her eyes opened once more, she looked at Robless with a strange intensity. "You don't know me. And I don't know you. You know it," her eyes shifted to her shadow for a long moment before she locked eyes with the man once more, voice shaking slightly but eyes fiery, "And it knows you intimately."

Aya drew another long, steadying breath. "It's a part of me. It doesn't define me... I don't want it to define me." Internally she warred with herself. Was she simply denying the fact that the shadow defined her? Was it possible for her to change, to hold it at bay? Or was it truly hopeless? Was it already too late; was she already soiled by its stain?

"I want you to tell me. I want to know why I exist. I want to know why I was cursed with this, why it's my job to carry this burden. Why do I have to be the one to suffer." It wasn't a question.

"Tell me why."

A fire burned in Aya's eyes. It spoke of passion, of fury and determination. But beneath that, her voice betrayed something else. Fear, hopelessness, desperation. She was lost, stranded in darkness, frantically searching for a way out. Robless knew that feeling well, as deeply as it knew him.

"I know you more than you think. The shadow, the parasite...you don't understand. You are the shadow. It becomes you, makes you do the unthinkable."

The Battle of Snow Dove raged around them. It was supposed to be a decisive strike, aimed at eliminating the Kazessqui and Alteriians in one fell swoop. He did not count on the Kazesqui sacrificing themselves. Their agonizing screams echoed those of their Alteriian brethren, torn from their partners. Robless barely winced.

"It can't, however, define you any more than your actions. Even if your actions are terrifying beyond all proportions."

The view shifted to the space around the Myrionith home worlds. The sun's light shimmered amid the wreckage of entire fleets. It suddenly expanded into a blinding white light that engulfed everything. When it faded, the wreckage was gone, and so were the planets, now nothing more than floating rocks.

"You have a choice, but you have to be strong. I wasn't strong enough. That's why you're here."

Robless found himself staring into the dying eyes of his own body. Crimson blood pooled beside his head, the pistol clutched in his hands still smoking. Only one tear of self-pity. Pathetic. He kicked his nearly-dead self. A light appeared out of nowhere, and drifted into his body.

"Your mother saved me. I was too weak to go on, but I thought that maybe the Thel-ghan'che would die with me. When she left my body, she took it with her. The parasite had grown strong from fighting my mind, too strong. Eris-Tam couldn't fight it."

Wisps of light surrounded them. The Lyikos pool glowed brightly as they watched the entities of light floating around. Robless stared into the pool reflectively before continuing. His voice was quiet, reserved.

"We thought these would kill it. We were wrong. All we did was separate the parasite from your mother. And so, you're here. To contain something that the both of us could not. I'm sorry. I was too weak. Do you see how unfair it all is for you?"

Aya and Robless were back in the white room where they started. He leaned against one of the walls, arms folded, eyes lowered. His eyes hid countless regrets. It was almost as if he was talking to himself when he spoke again.

"Ultimately, those choices I made were mine. Blame the parasite if you must, but I cannot lie to myself or to anyone else. You will have choices to make too. Choose wisely, unless you want to live with an even heavier burden later."

Aya's spine had gone completely rigid at some point during the stream of images that Robless showed her. It was stubbornness, pure and simple—the kind of strong will that she had inherited from her mother.

She did not want the darkness to consume her, but she did. She did not want to destroy things, but she wanted to cause destruction. She did not want to hurt anyone, but she wanted to tear them apart.

Maybe the will she inherited from her mother would be enough to stop those urges. That seemed like a good possibility... until Aya remembered, with a slight chuckle from that darker side of her, that even her mother's will had been broken by the parasite.

As Robless finished speaking, Aya wanted to scream at how unfair it all was. She wanted to lash out, to yell, to cry, because now she had to fight for her own sanity against something that leaders, people she looked up to, people far stronger than she could ever be, had failed against.

How could she do that? How was it possible? How could she ever have enough strength to get through this intact when even they had not?

The inevitability of her collapse and her failure began to weigh down on her. It felt like she was being crushed alive by fate, given a burden much too heavy for her young mind to handle, and she knew that she would not last. She knew that it would overtake her, and soon; she would not be able to fight it for long.

Then she arrived suddenly at an epiphany, and with it came an onrush of dizziness.

Aya's head felt light and her body felt heavy, for a moment she thought her knees would not hold her up as she unsteadily stumbled towards the wall where Robless leaned, bracing her hand against it for support. Her breathing was ragged and tears stung at the corner of her eyes, faced with this realization that she could not win, that she could never win. She slowly slid down against the wall when her legs started to wobble, and she hugged her knees close to her chest.

It took a long time for her to calm herself, or it felt like a long time. It could have been seconds or it could have been an hour, Aya was not sure. But eventually the tears receded and her breathing evened out, and she whispered, "There's really no hope, is there?

"It's different for me than it was for you. If what you said is right... It isn't just inside me, it's... it is me. I... am it." Her voice trembled with fear but sounded far away, as if she was already beginning to give up, as if she was retreating into herself. "My actions are its actions... and its actions are mine. Because we're one and the same..."

She paused for a very long time, tears again breaking through and streaming down her cheeks though her expression and voice were unchanged.

"I cannot defeat it. At least you, you had a chance, and so did she. You could fight it, you could... you could try. You could at least know that you had tried, even if you failed. But nothing that I do... could ever stop it. It doesn't matter if I'm strong enough. It doesn't matter because I can't even fight." She looked up at Robless with a clear and empty gaze even through the tears. "I was given this burden because it would never be enough just to fight, and now I will never be able to stop it."

The unspoken conclusion that Aya did not dare to voice was that the only way it could ever be stopped was with her own death. It would end with her, no matter her actions... and the thought occurred to her that maybe Ell had been right to hate her all along.

"I am nothing more than a parasite."

Robless remained silent while Aya struggled to come to terms with everything he had just said. When she was done speaking, when there was nothing but tears left, he reached out and placed a hand of her shoulder. He spoke, calm and reassuring.

“Wrong. You may be the parasite, but the parasite is not you. You are something more, something greater, and that something is yourself. Most of the others don’t understand. They only see the parasite, not the person beneath it, someone more powerful and more beautiful than the parasite could ever be.”

Aya looked surprised when Robless wiped the tears streaming down her face. Her eyes desperately needed hope; they longed for a way through and sought reason within madness. He would arm her with that one crucial weapon to fight the Thel-ghan’che: hope.

“Does it really seem inevitable? Is it so hopeless? It might seem that way, I understand, but the shadow’s victory is not written in the stars. You have the part of you that is still you. You can fight, I trust in you that much, but you must fight, for everyone. I know, it’s a lot to ask of you, but you will have to trust me too if you are to overcome the parasite.”

Robless crouched in front of her, meeting her gaze. His own eyes showed caring, hope, and a spirit of determination that could only be his.

“Did I ever tell you why you are here? Why you were created? You’re here because you are the only one who can fight - and defeat - the Thel-ghan’che. You are stronger than all of us could ever be against the parasite. You might think you’re young and inexperienced, and you are right, but that’s what makes you strong. You don’t have our long pasts, our fears and doubts, our regrets: things the parasite used against us.”

“And I may be determined,” he said with a slight but caring smile, “But I am not brash. I chose you for a reason. So be strong. Stand up and fight for us. For your mother. For me.” Robless offered his hand, willing to help her back up.

Aya hesitated briefly but accepted his hand, standing shakily, still a little startled by his kindness. A small part of her wondered how someone who so readily accepted the horrible acts the parasite forced him to do could still be so kind and gentle.

She started to think that maybe the parasite hadn’t been the same for him as it was for her mother, for Eris-Tam; maybe it was that those thoughts already existed in Robless’ mind before the parasite took hold? Maybe it did not have to break him first to find that darkness in him? Aya thought this might be right, and part of her wanted to know more, to understand more fully how that worked.

His sympathy still came as a surprise, and she stood still for a long moment, sniffling the last of her tears away, looking at Robless. It was then that she realized how embarrassed she should be, how she just broke down in front him, but she could not bring herself to care enough to do anything more than avert her eyes slightly.

It took some courage and some blind faith, but she stepped forward into his arms. Fast enough that she would not lose motivation and stop herself, but slow enough that he could still stop her if she made him uncomfortable.

“Thank you… I’m sorry for being a burden, for… for being trouble… Thank you, uh, s-sir…”

Robless, almost as surprised to find Aya in his arms as she was to find compassion in his heart, welcomed it nonetheless. It touched his heart to see someone so fragile and so scared trust in him as Aya just had. He held her close, but gently, and tried to ease her nerves with a comforting smile.

"It's alright, there's no need to thank me. Remember, it is my burden, not yours, laying on your shoulders. I know you have so many questions, and I apologize for providing so few answers in return."

Aya laid her head on his shoulder, quietly. It was a difficult situation to cope with, Robless understood, and she needed somebody to confide in. He would do, for now, he hoped. Many things he couldn’t explain, and he was uncertain whether he understood the parasite as well as he though he did. Maybe she was right; maybe the Thel-ghan’che knew him more intimately than he could ever know it.

“I’m sorry, Aya, I’m so sorry. It’s a curse, I know, and a curse you will have to live with. I wish I had all the answers. I wish there was an easy way out. I wish I could just make it alright. But I can’t right now. You understand, right, Aya?”

Aya sniffed, and slowly replied, "I understand..."

But there were so many questions spiraling like a raging tornado through her mind that she felt like she really didn't understand, like she truly knew nothing at all. One question stood out far more than most, and it was the one that lay at the bottom of the deep pit of worry in her stomach.

"What happens if I can't do it?"

The way she bit her lip and averted her eyes slightly betrayed her nervousness, but also her hope that Robless would have an answer that wasn't utterly terrifying.

"What if... I'm not strong enough?"

Robless froze where he stood. At least up to this point, he had somewhat of a grasp on the subject. He frowned, unsure, brow furrowed in concentration, eyes lowered to the ground. His confidence wavered a little, but the face in front of him - nervous, yet hopeful reminded him of what he was fighting for. Robless' resolve returned and, after a long silence, looked back up at Aya, a little regret in his eyes.

“I don’t know.” Robless shook his head. “It’s always been in the back of my mind, but the parasite moved on before I ever had the chance to find out myself. You know, I don’t believe anyone before you has been strong enough, but...”

He sighed, and placed his hand over Aya’s shoulder. “You aren’t the same as the rest of us. The parasite can’t move on to another person. If it did - well, if it did, both you and the parasite would cease to exist. You are connected with it. As much as I hate to say this, the only one who could tell you what would happen is yourself. You will know the parasite better than anyone, in due time.”

I can only hope you can stay strong until then. Or we will all be in greater danger than you or I could ever imagine.

Aya let out a shaky sigh, casting her eyes down once more and furrowing her brows. "I guess..." Really, what was going through her head was that she was stuck with it because it couldn't move on to another person. She caught herself before she could think that she wished she could give it to someone else, that she would rather anyone else have it than her.

Really, it was true. But she couldn't admit that... it made her seem so weak, so selfish. She'd been weak her entire life... she couldn't do anything but run away. She hadn't changed anything... She'd felt threatened by the Alteriians and by Eris-Ell, and her only solution had been to run away. Verax was still falling apart more every day and she couldn't do anything about it.

She had been weak for so long already, and she didn't want to be weak anymore. Robless said she was strong, said she was the only one strong enough to do it... but she didn't feel strong. She felt overwhelmed, and she felt used.

Aya could wish to give the parasite to someone else, but there was no point in wishing for the impossible. She would have to be strong, or she would have to let the parasite win. Those were the only options: one that looked impossible, and one that she could never allow. Too many people were counting on her to stay strong... it was a burden as much as it was a motivation.

She had to win, she had to beat this...

You will know the parasite better than anyone.

Maybe that was the first step. It thought it would have the upper hand by trying to force her into accepting the information it offered on its previous victims, but maybe Aya could turn that around. Maybe by accepting that information she could make the first move towards knowing the parasite. Maybe it would make her stronger, make fighting it easier. She could learn its ways... and have a better idea of how to counteract them.

In that moment, she decided--and she let down her barriers. The information flooded into her conscious mind, and her body abruptly went rigid. Tense silence was followed by the sound of gasping, and Aya's faltering footsteps as she staggered away from Robless. She tripped once and nearly fell, and when she regained her balance she looked at him with eyes full of knowledge, fear, and shock.

It wasn't a slow piecing together of information, it was just an abrupt knowing. Suddenly she knew everything that the parasite had done to him, how it had twisted him and defeated him. How he watched as his own thoughts and ambitions were twisted in on themselves by its darkness, and how it destroyed him.

It felt like she knew too much.

It felt like no one should ever know so much about another person, like no one should bear witness to such utter defeat. He had nearly won, in the end. She respected that; he had been able to push back hard enough for a brief moment... just long enough that he could have beaten it. But the agony and the horror of the rest of it was too much...

Aya blinked quickly, still looking horrified at the new knowledge, and she attempted to stutter out an apology that she knew lacked any semblance of coherence before she dashed towards the door.

It wasn't only the shock of that information that propelled her forwards. It was one part distress and two parts fear, fear of herself. If the parasite could do that to someone then wouldn't the best course of action be to keep herself as far away from any other living person as possible? Of course she knew what it could do, what it had done, but that was different than witnessing it firsthand. That was different than remembering doing it. Because what if she did fail? What if she couldn't hold control of her other half?

She deserved to be locked up, it deserved to be locked up, or worse. It deserved to die... she deserved to die. She didn't want to die. But she needed to be far away... she needed to be apart from other people, she needed to be away from them, she needed to disappear, she needed...

Aya couldn't think straight, so she reacted like she always had. She ran. She felt shame and tears sting her cheeks, but there was nothing she could do.

She threw open the door to Robless' cell, and made to dash for the next door.

Robless could feel the energy surge in the air, could see the concentration and subsequent struggle of Aya. He tried to reach forward and steady her as she lost her balance, but Aya straightened out and the look on her face betrayed her enlightenment. Then, suddenly, she bolted for the door. Robless stood there for a moment, realizing what she had done, before taking after her.

“Aya, wait!”

Aya was already through the first door, but years of physical training allowed him to easily catch up with her before she even turned around. She looked puzzled that Robless had chased her down.

“I know it’s hard but you need to listen to me. What you just saw was frightening, I realize. My past is dark, as I’ve said, and few would choose to walk down it given the choice. You have. It was a tough decision, but it had to be made.”

Robless’ eyes held a tinge of sadness - of regret for the things he did: the people he killed, the lives he ruined, the worlds he destroyed. More than everything, he regretted the fact that the poor Kazesqui in front of him had to carry his burden on top of her own.

“You’re a little stronger now, a little more able to overcome the darkness. You’re a brave girl to endure this. Every small step forward you make counts. It’s a terrifying prospect, yes, but you have to keep going. You have to push forwards if you want to win.”

He looked into her face. There was fear, hope, and a burning desire to defeat the parasite, but below it all, deep in Aya’s heart, Robless could see an unnoticeable inkling of resentment, not directed at him, but at the unfair reality of the world around her.

“A word of advice: it doesn’t have to be your fight. Keep the ones you trust near. They can make the difference between victory and death. My memories hold witness to that. And remember one thing. You can run if you want. You can give up. Or you can fight. It’s your choice, a reminder of your own free will.”

I pray that she can make the right decisions, for the sake of all of us.

Aya looked down, taking deep breaths to try to calm herself.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I-I'm..." she still felt like she was gasping, like it didn't matter how many breaths she took. She still didn't feel like she could breathe. "I'm sorry... I'm sorry I did all those things to you..."

She took another few moments, ignoring the slightly stern confusion appearing on Robless' face, before continuing, "I... It is a part of me... I remember doing all of things it did... I remember putting you through that because... in a way, I did--a part of me did... technically that is still half of what I am, and I..." She looked down at her hands for a long time, then looked back up to meet his eyes once more.

"You should hate me... Why don't you? I did all those things to you... I twisted your ambition to match my own, I encouraged you every step of the way--to destroy, to kill, to hate... How can you not hate me? How can you stand to be around me?"

{For Robless, posted since he couldn't post from his phone}


Robless remembered all the parasite had done to him, yet all he felt was concern for Aya and a little sadness for himself. He saw her distressing, her worry, and simply put his arms around her and held her there, as if she were his own child.

“It’s okay. Everything that’s happened. Everything the parasite did. It’s all said and done; the past is mine alone to atone for.” He sighed, looking down at her with an expression of regret.

“You aren’t totally to blame. You aren’t completely evil. Neither is the parasite, nor me. Evil-” His face assumed a look of disdain. “How I despise that word. It's far too subjective." He shook his head. "We're all in this together from here on out. I am responsible for your existence after all."

He smiled slightly, trying to be as calm and comforting as he could.